Tractor-trailer slams into truck, driver survives

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Jason Reed

September 6, 2010 8:54:49 PM PDT

RALEIGH --

A Raleigh man says he is counting his blessing after a tractor-trailer slammed into the back of his car.Jason Reed says he was driving his silver truck down Capital Boulevard over the weekend on his way to the hospital to see his new-born son when he stopped at a stop light. He says seconds later a tractor-trailer slammed into the back of his truck, causing him to go off the road and hit a power pole.

"Looking straight ahead, looked up in the rear view mirror and all I could see was red tractor-trailer coming towards me next thing I knew I had gotten shot through the intersection," Reed said. "I tried to get out of the driver side I was shaking uncontrollably and I was trying to get out of the passenger door. Once I got out and was able to see the truck, lucky to be alive when I saw that truck in the rearview mirror honestly I thought that was it."

Reed's wife was waiting for him at Rex's Hospital and he did make it there, but not in a way either of them expected. Instead of being a visitor he arrived as a patient to get treatment in the ER.

"I only let myself think about it for a split second about how it would be to raise him by myself and it was absolutely terrifying, so I'm very glad that he's ok and he's still here," Rebecca Reed said.

Reed is okay and is now at home with his wife and four-day-old son Carter.

The couple says they are grateful he was the only one in the truck when the accident happened.

"The back of the truck where the child would have been sitting was completely crushed the whole back seat was completely gone, I couldn't imagine what would have happened had they been with me," Reed said.

He says he can't describe just how lucky he feels to be alive.

"Having something like that happen to me it is just kind of surreal, looking back on it now," Reed said.